Not This Day
by Elinde
Summary: Fluff. My take on one of the much written scenes in Thranduil and Legolas' lives. Inspired by a story about a baby girl who brought her mother out of a coma.


**Disclaimer: Thranduil, Galion and Legolas belong to JRR Tolkien. Rîneglan, Eruwest and Thranduil's wife belong to me. **

A/N: 'Wow, Ellie's writing stuff. Must be an exam looming.' Yup; Linguistics tomorrow and English Lang on Friday, but I've done 24 hours of revision so yeah. This was meant to be just a few hundred words long and a flashback in another story I'm writing set not long after this, but then it grew and became a standalone. I wrote this between 10pm and 1am this morning – I get all my ideas at stupid o' clock – and I think that shows but oh well.

I never thought I'd write this scene. There are a few cliché scenes when you write fanfiction of these characters and I seem to have written my version of two/three, depending on how you count, recently, even though a while ago I decided to leave them alone. This is _very_ cliché, and I ummed and arred over publishing it at all, but I hope you enjoy it anyway. I'll write some weirder stuff when I've bounced back from exams.

* * *

He held the Elfling in his arms.

"There he is," Rîneglan said.

Legolas twisted in the warrior's arms and reached out his hand towards Thranduil.

"Ada," he announced.

Galion, who had been leaning on the side of the bed, raised his head from his hands and blinked at Rîneglan and the little prince. He looked from them to the king and back again, before straightening up and leaning back in his chair.

Legolas waved both arms in his father's direction: "Ada!"

"Aaalright," Rîneglan said, trying to calm the elfling down; "Listen to me, tithen pen; your father's very tired, okay? He's fast asleep. And sometimes when people are fast asleep it looks like they're ignoring you. But they aren't, okay?"

But Legolas wasn't listening. When Rîneglan set him on the ground he clambered onto the bed and lay in the gap between Thranduil and the edge. Thranduil's head was turned slightly towards him. He giggled, thinking his father was awake but pretending not to be. His face fell when he got no reaction.

"Ada?"

He tapped Thranduil's cheek, and tapped it again harder when still nothing happened.

"He's very tired," Rîneglan repeated, gently.

"But he's been very tired for ages."

"Istin, tithen pen."

Out of the corner of his eye, Rîneglan saw Galion shift. The butler stood and pinched the bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger. Legolas meanwhile had curled up against his father's chest, smiling and humming to himself. So when Galion motioned for him to follow him to the far end of the room Rîneglan complied.

"Has something changed?" he asked, his voice low.

Galion folded his arms and looked back at the king and prince. "No; that's the problem."

"Why is that a problem?"

Galion winced.

"It's only been a week."

Galion shifted. It was a long while before he spoke, but when he did his voice had the tone of a conspirator: "His wounds aren't that bad. He should have woken by now."

"These things are so subjective-"

"That's the thing. I don't think he's trying."

Rîneglan's frown was a question. Galion winced again, as though the words he spoke made him a traitor: "I don't think he wants to wake up. That wound in his abdomen… no orc made that." Rîneglan's stare became icy cold. "And then there's this," Galion said quickly before he could be rebuked. He slipped a piece of parchment out from under his belt and handed it to Rîneglan.

_Should I, Thranduil King of Greenwood, and I, Míriel Queen of Mirkwood, no longer be able to care for our son Legolas, Prince of Mirkwood, we entrust him to Hiril Eruwest, and her son Herdir Rîneglan, and our dear friend Herdir Galion, to raise as they think best as the future king of this realm. For as long as there is an Elven realm in the Greenwood, the prince Legolas shall be raised there and nowhere other._

Then followed the king and deceased queen's signatures. Rîneglan reread it before looking up at Galion.

"When was this written?"

Galion shrugged: "You know what Thranduil's like. It could easily be as old as the prince."

A pause, then: "What does it mean?"

"It means that he knows Legolas won't be sent to Imladris or Lothlórien should he become orphaned," Galion stated flatly. Rîneglan blinked, dumfounded, his gaze flicking between Galion and the king and prince. Legolas was currently trying to wake his father up by tickling his neck.

"He's giving up?" Rîneglan half asked, half stated: "But he wouldn't give up, he wouldn't."

"Grief is overwhelming," Galion answered. His calmness was deceptive. Inside he felt exactly how Rîneglan looked. "Maybe-"

But he stopped as Rîneglan covered his mouth with his hand. The weight of something else had just hit him: "He's left Legolas to us."

"Yes, he has."

"He trusts us so much that he's- he's fading because of us."

Galion shook his head: "No-"

"We can't raise him! I can't… not knowing that…"

"We won't have to raise him; he's not going to die."

Rîneglan looked down at Galion, then followed the Silvan's gaze to where Legolas was now perched on the edge of the bed, staring at his father.

"If anyone can wake him up, it's him."

"But that's not working," Rîneglan exclaimed.

Galion clasped and unclasped his hands for a while, before realising something.

"He needs to talk."

"What?"

"Legolas," Galion said louder, striding over to the prince with faux confidence, "you need to talk to your father like you would if he were-"

Alive. Had he really almost said that?

"Awake. You need to tell him all about what you've been doing, what you want to do tomorrow, what you want to do with him when he wakes up. Everything."

"But he doesn't reply," Legolas said, his lower lip jutting out.

"That doesn't matter. You need to talk to him so he knows you're here, that you're impatient for him to get out of bed."

"But he knows that anyway. He's my ada; of course I want him to be up."

"You know," Galion knelt beside the bed and leant on the mattress so Legolas had to look down at him, "I think he might be so tired that he's forgotten. Can you imagine such a thing?"

Legolas shook his head.

"Well I think this is the problem we have, tithen pen." A smile; "Wake him up so you can tell him how silly he is."

Legolas looked at him; "he's not silly."

Galion's resolve began to falter: "Just… talk to him."

The prince became wary as he realised something was wrong: "But nothing I have to say matters."

"It all matters; you're his son. It all matters."

Galion moved away, realising the elfling might feel self-conscious in front of other people. He and Rîneglan settled on the opposite side of the room and pretended to hold a conversation of their own.

When he thought he wasn't being listened to, Legolas did start talking to his father. He lay as close to Thranduil as he could and told him about everything; about the squirrel he'd found in the granary which he'd wanted to keep as a pet but it escaped, about how he'd gone into the stables and nana's horse was whinnying and whinnying, about how everyone was looking at him weirdly and he didn't like it, about how Rîneglan or Galion and one night Eruwest put him to bed and how they did things wrong and he couldn't sleep and why didn't nana tuck him in anymore and where was she and when will you wake up, ada? I want a hug, ada. The elfling wrapped his arm around his father as best he could but his arms weren't long enough and the blankets got in the way. But he kept trying. He burrowed his hands into the blankets, kissed his father's cheek and rested his head against Thranduil's chest.

Rîneglan and Galion watched him. The emotion in Legolas' childish words had rendered them immobile. Immobile that is until the unmistakable sound of a child's swallowed sobs reached them. And still Thranduil made no sign. Or so it seemed. They could not see past Legolas' head, so could not see the king's eyelids flutter as something began pulling him back. As he stopped walking towards the blindingly bright halls before him, towards the unknown, and listened, remembered, half turned back._ Legolas? _He called, but he was still too far from the living world for cry to be heard, or felt, or Known.

So Legolas sensed no change either. But he knew something else. As adult hands came to take him from his father, he knew this was it. That their words of it being late were only half true. That he mustn't leave. So he kicked the hands that held him and screamed for his father. He did not know that he had been crying and calling his father's name for almost an hour. He could not know the anguish Galion and Rîneglan had felt leaving him like that for so long. All he knew was he wanted his father, and at that moment Rîneglan was the enemy denying him that.

And that was all Thranduil knew, wherever he was. All through the bloodied halls and passageways his mind had made at a failed attempt at a last refuge, he heard his son's cries. All he knew was that someone was stealing his son, an enemy who would hurt him, an enemy who had to be stopped. His own selfishness could wait. He began to run.

Rîneglan finally positioned the elfling over his shoulder, so Legolas' punches reached his back rather than his chest. The prince was still screaming. From over Rîneglan's shoulder he could see his father's face, and now he saw the flickering. His screams redoubled and Galion sank back into the bedside chair, head in his hands, too crippled by his sense of defeat to wonder what had made the child scream louder.

"We'll come back tomorrow," Rîneglan said. He didn't know if this was a lie or not. Legolas twisted and tried to scratch the Sinda's neck.

It was to this cacophony that Thranduil returned. He had eyes and ears only for his son. His body was heavy, but as he sat up he felt no resistance. He saw his son, saw that his son saw him, saw that he was being born away.

"_Daro!"_

Rîneglan's surprise was so great that he almost dropped Legolas. Galion's was even greater; he just stared at Thranduil, now sat bolt upright, as though he were staring at a ghost. Though he'd never seen such a look directed at him before, Rîneglan knew what the icy flames in Thranduil's eyes meant.

_Put my child down._

Rîneglan complied, and Thranduil's gaze was so ferocious that he backed away as far as he was able.

The adrenaline which has brought him back so completely numbed Thranduil's body. He forgot he had any wounds until he tried to get out of bed, whereupon the all-consuming pain from his knife wound made him slump back against his pillows. But that was no matter; by that time Legolas was already back at his side, arms round his neck and laughing.

Legolas refused to leave that night. As did Galion. While Legolas dozed happily, as much of his weight on Thranduil's chest as the king could bear, the adults stared into the darkness of the room.

"It really happened, didn't it?" The king asked eventually. Galion looked at him: the deep shadows made Thranduil's face look not just thin but gaunt. "When I couldn't feel anything, I thought… I hoped it was just a nightmare. And then I felt the pain… I thought we were still out there, in the glade. I thought her… _she_ was right beside me. I thought Rîneglan was an enemy. I wanted to hurt him." He closed his eyes and sighed. And winced as the movement tugged on his wound. "How close was I?"

"I thought we'd lost you," Galion said quietly, frankly. His love for his friend and terror for him enriched his voice as he spoke. "That was why we took Legolas away; we didn't want him to be so close when you…"

"Thank you," Thranduil whispered.

Silence. But it wasn't awkward; it was more relieved than words can say.

* * *

**Translations:**

_Ada _– dad

_Nana – _mum

_Istin _– I know

_Tithen pen _– little one

_Daro _– stop, halt

A/N: The bloodied halls Thranduil sees when wandering between realms is based on how I think Menegroth looked after the battle there, so blood on the floors and the walls, bits of bodies, corpses everywhere… only without the corpses. In my head!canon Oropher got caught up in that battle and when the rest of the village was killed by opportunists Thranduil was led by a young elleth down to Menegroth. That was the only time he saw Menegroth but he was told in the lays that it was a beautiful sanctuary. So when he was dying his brain tried to pull up this beautiful city for him to walk through, but _his_ memories of it came through too so that's why everything's dark and covered in blood.

Also sometimes I think I should do a purple prose description of Thranduil because I haven't described how I see him in a while, apart from that one thing up there, and I think I took down the stories where I did. And what with the films and that… just fyi if you're imagining film!Thranduil here then good luck; apart from the traits stipulated by Tolkien practically everything I imagine him to be is the opposite of Lee's version. Team Leonard… okay why am I saying this?


End file.
